Mrs. Pritchard hesitated for a reply. “Well, I don’t just know why you shouldn’t; only it struck me as perhaps the Squire would not be best pleased. You see, he never names them now, nor never has done. It seems to hurt him like.” Bertie looked down at his letters and then up at Mrs. Pritchard. “But he can’t have forgotten,” he said,—“I’m sure he hasn’t forgotten.” “Bless your little heart! it isn’t that he forgets, but that he thinks too much.” “Thinks of them, you mean?” questioned Bertie, indicating the four names he had written. “Yes, of them as have gone before. Poor man, I doubt if they’re ever long out of his thoughts.” Bertie looked up very gravely. “And if he is always thinking of them, he can’t mind seeing their names written. Perhaps he would like it; perhaps he would be pleased that somebody else thought of them and loved them too.” Mrs. Pritchard wiped her eyes with the corner of her pocket-handkerchief. “Well, for sure, a child knows best sometimes, as I do always say. We’ll let them stay any way, dearie. I doubt if the poor master ever so much as walks this way now.” Bertie did not know. He had never seen the Squire in this part of the garden. Perhaps he avoided the plot of ground which his dead children had once frequented so much. It was Saturday when the gardens were finally put to rights, and Bertie’s week of toil had done him good, and made him feel more of a man. The weather had been bright and fine, and he had been able to be out most of the daylight hours, so he had seen less of the Squire than usual. But Sunday was Bertie’s best time for making way in that quarter. The Squire was at leisure, for one thing; then he always took the child to church in the morning, and the two dined together after service, as Bertie had once petitioned to do. Not much conversation went on as a rule between this oddly-assorted couple; but Bertie enjoyed his Sundays immensely, and looked forward to them all through the week. As they sat at table together on this particular day, Bertie asked a question. “Didn’t the clergyman say that there would be service in the afternoon now, instead of in the evening?” “Yes; it changes in winter months always.” “Why?” “Because the evenings are so dark, and the poor people from the farms, who have a long way to come, can hardly find their way.” “Do you always go in the afternoon the same as in the evening?” “Yes, certainly.” “May I go with you, please?” The Squire hesitated. “I think not to-day—not until I have asked Dr. Lighton what he thinks.” Bertie looked surprised. “I’m not ill,” he said. “No; but Dr. Lighton has his own ideas about you. I cannot take you with me this afternoon.” Bertie never disputed the Squire’s final verdict; he accepted it as an oracle. But he looked a little disappointed, and sat very still, with his eyes upon his plate. Suddenly a bright thought seemed to strike him, and he looked up eagerly.